Most, if not all, areas of the country have building codes requiring that smoke detectors or smoke alarms be installed in almost all structures, at least of new construction. The installation of such devices has proven to be a life saving measure, as the warning provided can often alert persons within the structure to evacuate the structure in a timely manner.
In current homes, thermostats are provided that can communicate wirelessly with various devices in the home, such as smoke detectors, CO detectors, air dampers, water heater controls, furnace controls and other devices that may or may not be line powered including remote sensors, systems and appliances. The thermostat can function as a central controller for the home and can communicate information to and from the other devices wirelessly, typically using RF communication or may be a node on an in-home network that intercommunicates with other devices. In either case, the network can be a point-to-point, star, mesh or any other suitable network infrastructure that uses RF, Powerline, infra-red or any other media that is deemed to be reliable and sufficient to meet the needs of the system.
Severe weather, particularly localized and rapidly forming weather such as tornadoes, also takes a toll of life in many areas. Accordingly, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has implemented an FM radio network across the U.S. to provide severe weather warnings on a region or area-specific basis.
In 1994, the weather warning system was improved by implementing “Specific Area Message Encoding” (SAME), in which each broadcast is preceded by a “Federal Information Processing System” (FIPS) code. Weather radios with this system include means for setting the receiver to be activated only by a specific code. Thus, a severe weather warning broadcast intended to cover only a certain area (e.g., a county), will be preceded by a “FIPS” code only for that county. Only radios that have been set to be activated by that specific code will be activated by the broadcast to produce a suitable alarm and/or voice broadcast of the severe weather warning.
However, relatively few people have purchased, or have access to, such weather warning radios, for various reasons. Yet, severe weather which hits an area at night can be tragic in terms of loss of life. The provision and use of such radios, particularly those using the “SAME” system of regionally coded messages, could do much to save lives in such situations.
Accordingly, a need will be seen for an emergency warning device which combines the features of a thermostat and severe weather warning radio. The device provides a single, central receiving device for sudden emergency situations and can provide a signal to an alarm-type device, such as but not limited to a smoke or CO detector, to provide an audible alarm or to a vibrating or visual alarm strobe device to alert those who might be hearing impaired, in the event of severe weather in the area. Preferably, the thermostat including the emergency warning device and any peripheral alarm nodes is powered by standard household electrical power and includes backup battery power.